Articles / The Science of

Not content with a single brief foray into neo-futurism with Black Ops 2, the latest Call of Duty is an out-and-out science fiction adventure. It’s also the weakest game in the series’ history, with its aggregated review score struggling to leave the 70% zone. We reviewed the multiplayer and campaign modes separa... Read More »

The Challenge Months ago we posted the “Ultimate Science of” challenge. I pledged to complete ‘Tough Mudder’ in an effort to re-enact many of the things we see in games in real life. Well, last weekend I donned my combat armour and suffered freezing temperatures, gruelling physical challenges, and even 10,000 volt elec... Read More »

What’s Call of Duty been missing recently? That’s right – astronauts fighting. This week’s new campaign trailer for the upcoming game, Call of Duty Ghosts, showed an all out battle going on in orbit – and we think we’ve found some hidden space-gems for you. Take a look and see what you think. The trailer opens with an ... Read More »

I’m not going to lie – I’m enjoying this. Star Trek is above all other universes in my personal ‘premier league’ of science fiction. Part two doesn’t need much introduction, but if you feel you want one then check out part one, which covered Tricorders, Phasers, and Magnetic Boots. Solar Collector Station Vulcans may n... Read More »

Star Trek is the god-father of science fiction. Maybe even minus the ‘father’. Trek is one of those rare pieces of sci-fi where, rather than deriving its technology from things that already exist, it inspired the invention of the fictional technologies created for the show. For example, an iPad is essentially the same ... Read More »

When it comes to marrying science and video-games, nobody does it like Half Life. The Science of Half Life is consistently top-notch – from the titles of the games themselves down to every piece of equipment you use. This week we’ll be looking closely at some of the game’s weaponry. Bio-Electricity (Vortigaunts) In Hal... Read More »

The Half Life series is absolutely dripping with science. You could almost write a whole book on the Science of Half Life; there are so many lines of dialogue, gadgets, and other references to really interesting scientific notions. While we’re going for the traditional format of discussing one game at a time, this subj... Read More »

From Gordon Freeman to Tony Stark, hi-tech armour is an intrinsic part of science fiction in all media. Science isn’t all about blowing each other up; sometimes it’s about protecting yourself from blowing up. Joy. There are plenty examples of gadget-stuffed armour in video-game history, so let’s look at some of the rec... Read More »

Through the medium of videogames I’ve explored the galaxy, fought countless foes and led brave soldiers into hopeless battles. I’ve explored ancient cities from history, scaled iconic landmarks like the Coliseum, and dived fearlessly from their rooftops. I’ve foraged through dungeons and ruins, and tr... Read More »

The first two articles in this trilogy were very serious; we looked at plasma weapons and space lasers. Now we’re going to shed all common sense and look at some of the most entertaining weapons in videogame history. I’ll warn you now – there’s not actually much science to be found here. Weapon: Cerebral Bore (Tu... Read More »

Ever wanted to call down fire from the sky and obliterate a small town of innocent people? Well I have, so I’ve spent some time researching how to do it. My intensive scientific research naturally lead me to videogames, specifically Gears of War’s Hammer of Dawn, and the Command & Conquer Ion Cannon. Weapon: ... Read More »

Weapons are an essential part of videogames. They are the reason most of the current generation will apparently become serial-killers, much in the same way that people who grew up playing Tetris are now all brick-layers. But more accurately, a good, satisfying tool of destruction can be a source of tremendous enjoyment... Read More »

In recent years the Call of Duty franchise has suffered from a loss of plausibility in the perception of gamers and critics alike. This year Treyarch took a somewhat unexpected dive into the sea of science fiction by setting Black Ops 2 in the near-future. But one does not simply ‘make’ a sci-fi game, so the question i... Read More »

The epoch of high-definition consoles has opened a floodgate of opportunity for story-tellers to show us their visions in the gaming world. Now that HDMI and high-power processors are commonplace in the living room, developers have begun an all-out victory lap in imagining settings for us to explore. Where has their cr... Read More »

Last time we celebrated the humble origins of videogame spaceships, moving through to the golden age of the Asteroids ‘Triangle’ and arcade classic ‘Space Invaders’. We even managed to pick up a couple of scientific tricks from those early efforts, limited in scope as they may have been. With the darkening of the twili... Read More »

There is an instinctive and involuntary rising of the hairs on the back of one’s neck, whenever one sees an X-Wing dart heroically across a starry background, bright red bursts of laser-fire erupting from the four wing-tips. A similar feeling may be experienced while watching the Enterprise sail majestically in orbit o... Read More »

You live on a giant ball of liquid metal surrounded by a thin skin of rock, hurtling through the cosmos at about 100,000 miles per hour, trapped in the gravity well of 4-billion year-old nuclear explosion. If that’s not cool enough for you, I guess you could try some escapism in a game called “Halo”, where instead you ... Read More »

In Part 1 of The Science of Dead Space, we looked at the concept of mining planets and asteroids, comparing Dead Space’s vision of the future with reality. This time we’ll talk about blowing stuff up and saving the world. Asteroid Defence Cannon Everybody loves firing good ol’ fashioned cannons. According to Dead Space... Read More »